Able Friend frightens off foreign raiders
The Champions Mile will be a fully local affair for the first time in 11 years
The colossal shadow of the world's joint top-rated racehorse, Able Friend, has left the Jockey Club unable to attract a foreign runner to the HK$14 million Champions Mile next month for the first time since it became an international event.
The Group One Champions Mile was lifted from a domestic event to an international in 2005, the occasion etched indelibly in history as the first defeat for Silent Witness, and the race attracted three foreign runners even then.
We came up empty this year, partly because there is not much available and partly because Able Friend resides in Hong Kong
A total of 28 foreign competitors have turned up for the 10 runnings, albeit just one, Meiner Segal, for the 2008 race, when Good Ba Ba was at his peak.
When Mike de Kock-trained Variety Club downed Able Friend in a stunning success last year to become the first foreign-trained winner of the race, that might have been thought the signal to make the event more attractive and the Jockey Club added an extra HK$2 million sweetener to the prize money this year as well.
But the privilege of having the world's champion miler has ensured that connections of foreign milers want to avoid him.
